As worries about transit crime remain a key factor in New York City’s slow return-to-office rate, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, North America’s largest transportation network, plans to install security cameras in each of its subway cars to deter crime and ease commuters’ minds.
The MTA will install two cameras in all 6,455 New York City subway trains, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Tuesday. The move comes after a pilot program was announced in June to put security cameras for the first time in about 100 trains, which Hochul said at a news conference is “working very well.”
Real estate analysts have said getting workers back in Manhattan is key not only to rejuvenating the city’s economy by aiding retail sales, it’s also critical to turning around the record-high office vacancy rate in the heart of the biggest commercial property market.
“It’s starting to feel like the city’s moving again,” Hochul said, adding New York’s subway ridership on Sept. 14 surpassed 3.7 million riders in a new record high since the city, once the epicenter of the pandemic in the United States, was forced to shut down in March 2020.
“But as we listen to concerns, people are still concerned about transit crime. … I believe that these [cameras] will also be a deterrent to people. … That’s going to go a long way to helping easing people’s insecurities that they may have. … New Yorkers can just have a calm way to get on their way off to their jobs,” she said.
Despite recent pickups in subway ridership, the level is still just 60% to 70% of the pre-pandemic level, Hochul said.
The move comes as surveys by the Partnership for New York City, a business group with a membership that includes many of New York’s business leaders and companies, have shown fears about transit crime is a key factor that’s deterred workers’ return to their workplace. Even though employers’ push to get workers to return post-Labor Day looked to have paid some dividends, the reality is more than half of New York workers still have yet to return.
For instance, as of mid-September, 49% of Manhattan office workers are at their workplace on an average weekday, up from 38% in April and 28% in October, according to the latest Partnership survey of more than 160 major Manhattan office employers between Aug. 29 and Sept. 12.
Security firm Kastle Systems’ data released Tuesday also shows New York’s office utilization rate jumped nearly 9 percentage points to 46.6%, the highest during the pandemic, as of Sept. 14.